LiveWire handed Richard Rawlings an S2 Alpinista. Gas Monkey Garage gave it 1970s chopper attitude, zero exhaust pipes and one very uncomfortable question for the purists.
There are certain things motorcycling has taught us not to question.
Italian bikes should be dramatic. Adventure bikes should eventually get dirty. And a proper chopper should involve chrome, questionable ergonomics and enough combustion noise to annoy at least one neighbour.
An electric chopper?
That sounds almost contradictory.
And yet, Richard Rawlings and the crew at Gas Monkey Garage have somehow made the idea look completely natural.
At the 2026 Mama Tried Motorcycle Show in Milwaukee, LiveWire unveiled two one-off customs based on its S2 Alpinista electric motorcycle. One came from Jeff G. Holt of V-Twin Visionary. The other went through the Gas Monkey Garage treatment and emerged looking considerably less like a modern electric street bike and considerably more like something that escaped a custom-bike magazine from the 1970s.
Same Battery. Completely Different Attitude.
The production S2 Alpinista is a compact, modern electric sport-standard with 17-inch wheels, relatively upright ergonomics and a very obvious focus on urban performance.
Gas Monkey looked at all of that and apparently thought: needs more chopper.
The resulting one-off adopts the long, low visual attitude associated with old-school custom machines, deliberately hiding some of the clean-cut EV character of the donor bike beneath something far more rebellious.
And that is exactly why this build matters.
Electric motorcycles have spent years trying to convince riders with numbers: range, charging times, kilowatt-hours and acceleration figures.
Gas Monkey’s bike doesn’t immediately ask you to care about any of that.
It simply asks:
Does it look cool?
For a custom motorcycle, that’s arguably the more important question.
LiveWire itself describes the Gas Monkey machine as carrying unmistakable ’70s chopper attitude, while Holt’s second Alpinista went in a different, more performance-oriented custom direction. Both made their world debut at Mama Tried, where LiveWire reported record attendance for the show.
There’s Serious Hardware Underneath the Show Bike
The interesting part is that underneath the custom treatment sits a platform with considerably more performance than its silent operation might suggest.
In standard form, the S2 Alpinista produces 84 hp and 263 Nm of torque, hits 60 mph in around 3.0 seconds, and carries a 10.5 kWh battery. LiveWire quotes up to 194 km of city range, around 144 km in its combined 88 km/h test and approximately 115 km at a sustained 88 km/h. A 20-to-80-percent Level 2 charge takes around 78 minutes.
Those figures apply to the production Alpinista rather than the modified Gas Monkey bike, of course. Custom geometry, wheels, weight and other changes can affect performance and range.
But it does mean this isn’t simply an electric show prop.
There’s real motorcycle underneath it.
And quite a fast one.
Why This Should Interest Riders in the UAE
The UAE may actually be one of the more interesting places for this kind of motorcycle.
Dubai and Abu Dhabi already have a strong custom-bike culture. Cafe racers, baggers, bobbers and heavily modified Harleys aren’t unusual sights during the cooler riding months, and the local scene tends to appreciate machines that are different enough to start conversations before the rider has even taken off their helmet.
An electric custom like this would certainly manage that.
Infrastructure is also moving rapidly in the right direction. DEWA reported that Dubai had 1,864 public EV charging points by the end of 2025, with continued expansion through both DEWA and licensed private charging operators.
The bigger question is product availability and official after-sales support. In its March 2026 international expansion update, LiveWire highlighted a growing European dealer footprint but did not list the UAE among its established markets.
That makes this less of a “when can we order one?” story for UAE riders and more of a “LiveWire, are you watching this market?” story.
Because the combination makes sense: short urban journeys, improving EV infrastructure, a wealthy enthusiast market and a motorcycle community already comfortable spending serious time and effort making perfectly good motorcycles look completely different.
Sounds suspiciously like custom-bike territory to us.
Gas Monkey Isn’t Finished With LiveWire
More importantly, the S2 wasn’t a one-night experiment.
LiveWire and Gas Monkey Garage have already reunited for another project, this time using the smaller S4 Honcho Trail electric mini-moto.
Rawlings took delivery of the Honcho during the 2026 Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, with the completed custom scheduled to participate in a new S4 Honcho race category at Flat Out Friday on February 19, 2027, before appearing at the 2027 Mama Tried show.
That tells us LiveWire sees custom builders as more than a convenient marketing stunt.
They’re becoming part of the company’s attempt to make electric motorcycles feel like motorcycles first and EV products second.
And that’s probably the smarter battle to fight.
BN Verdict
On paper, an electric chopper sounds a little like ordering a shawarma without garlic sauce: technically possible, but you immediately question whether something important has been lost.
Then you see the Gas Monkey bike.
And annoyingly, it works.
A chopper has never really been about the most efficient engineering solution. It’s about attitude, individuality and turning up somewhere on a machine that guarantees somebody will walk over and ask, “What on earth is that?”
By that definition, this thing qualifies.
Would the old-school crowd complain that it doesn’t have a V-twin? Absolutely.
Would half of those same people still spend ten minutes staring at it in the parking lot? Also absolutely.
And as for the missing exhaust note, this is the UAE — chances are there’ll be another Harley somewhere nearby providing enough soundtrack for the entire group ride anyway.
Bike Nation score: 9/10 for attitude.
10/10 for starting arguments at the next bike-night coffee stop.
Would we ride one?
Definitely.
Would we ride it down Sheikh Zayed Road at 2pm in August?
We’re motorcycle enthusiasts, not lunatics.
So, Bike Nation readers: does an electric chopper count as a real chopper — or has Gas Monkey finally crossed a line?
Image Credits
Images courtesy of LiveWire and Gas Monkey Garage, provided through LiveWire’s official media resources and Business Wire press materials.
Sources
LiveWire official press releases via Business Wire and LiveWire Media.
